As the most reliable and balanced news aggregation service on the internet, DML News offers the following information published by WASHINGTONEXAMINER.COM:

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has been drawn into a skirmish with progressive groups that she accuses of attempting to “bribe” her to vote against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

The dust-up began when a campaign called Be A Hero, started last month by activist Ady Barkan, pledged to make a $1.3 million donation to Collins’ eventual 2020 opponent if the centrist GOP senator supports Kavanaugh. The effort reflects pressure that left-wing groups and abortion rights advocates are heaping on Collins ahead of Kavanaugh’s confirmation vote, likely to come in early October.

The article goes on to state the following:

Collins, who hasn’t announced how she will vote on Kavanaugh, vehemently pushed back on the donation, telling the site NewsMax on late Monday that she believes it is akin to a bribe.

“I consider this quid pro quo fundraising to be the equivalent of an attempt to bribe me to vote against Judge Kavanaugh,” she told the site.

Collins’ office also said on Tuesday the fundraising is “basically a bribe.”

“Sen. Collins will make up her mind based on the merits of the nomination,” spokeswoman Annie Clark told the Washington Examiner. “Threats or other attempts to bully her will not play a factor in her decision-making whatsoever.”

Mainers for Accountable Leadership, one of several progressive groups that joined the campaign, tweeted in response that Collins calling the effort of grass-roots donors a bribe is “politics at its worst.”

“Senator Collins may not really know what small dollar donations are, because during her election campaign less than 3 percent of her money came from small dollar donors while 44 percent came from PACs,” the group said.

The groups are using the crowd-funding site CrowdPAC to raise the funds. It posted a $1.3 million goal. As of late afternoon Tuesday, it had reached $1,029,321 from 36,960 donors.

.@senatorcollins may not know what small $ donations are: during her last election less than 3% of her $ came from small $ donors while 44% came from PACs, but that still doesn’t excuse smearing a grassroots effort from regular people pleading with someone in a position of power. https://t.co/y0w7Zv83wF

Small donors matter, @SenatorCollins. I donated $20.20 to this @AdyBarkan campaign not as a method of extortion of bribery. It was to show you just how important #StopKavanaugh is to me. Clearly this is important to the 37,690 people who also donated to date.

Sen. Collins, to Newsmax, on crowd funding a challenger if she votes for Kavanaugh: “I consider this quid pro quo fundraising to be the equivalent of an attempt to bribe me to vote against Judge Kavanaugh.”